Stevenson’s army, September 29
– WaPo has a bunch of pieces on the DOD testimony to the SASC on Tuesday. Here’s a link to the statements and hearing.
– Fred Kaplan analyzes the session.
– Politico notes questions being raised about AUKUS.
– More on Turkey’s defiance of US.
– Fiona Hill has new article in Foreign Affairs.
Politico Pro has this on solar tariffs:
SOLAR TARIFF PETITION GIVES BIDEN A CATCH-22: The Commerce Department must decide by Wednesday whether it will open an anti-circumvention investigation that could result in tariffs on solar panels from Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand.
The three nations are responsible for more than three-quarters of solar imports to the U.S. But American panel manufacturers say they only have that status because other importers reroute their solar components through those nations, in order to avoid anti-dumping and countervailing duties on China that have been in place since the Obama administration.
A third of solar projects at risk: If Commerce decides to extend the duties to the three Asian countries, solar project developers in the U.S. say it will force them to renegotiate prices or abandon projects altogether — hampering Biden’s goal to eliminate carbon emissions from electricity production by 2035. If the new duties on panels are approved, developers say, they could slash the rollout of solar projects in the U.S. by nearly a third over the next two years.
The new tariffs would be “absolute industry killers,” warned Ben Catt, CEO of Pine Gate Renewables, a North Carolina-based solar project developer. “If you were to put those tariffs on any of the projects we are doing right now, I just think the pricing structure gets thrown out the window.”
Climate “outside the scope”: Supporters of the tariff petition say that’s beside the point. If Commerce finds that importers are avoiding duties by rerouting their solar panels through the Southeast Asian nations, then by law the department must impose duties. Other concerns, like climate change, are “outside the scope of the case,” said Tim Brightbill, an international trade partner at Wiley Rein LLP, who is representing the petitioners.
Myriad trade issues: The tariff petition is just one of many trade challenges bedeviling the American solar sector. The Biden administration is also weighing whether to extend “Section 201” emergency safeguard duties that former President Donald Trump imposed on solar products from China, Taiwan and certain other suppliers in 2018. Those are currently set to expire in February, but petitioners want them renewed for four more years.
The administration is also considering new trade restrictions on solar panels and parts from the Xinjiang region, the center of human rights abuses in China that the U.S. has labelled a genocide. And American solar installers are also struggling with higher commodity prices and supply chain issues that are rippling through the economy.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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